Teenager Dies After Refusing To Go To The Toilet For Up To 8 Weeks

An inquest at Truro Crown Court has heard an autistic teenager died from a heart attack caused by constipation.

Emily Titterington, 16, suffered from 'stool withholding' and would go for up to eight weeks without going to the toilet.

Her family reportedly told BBC that Titterington would regularly hold her bowel movements for six to eight weeks at a time, because she had a phobia of toilets.

After her bowel grew so large it compressed her chest cavity and displaced other organs, Titterington collapsed at her home in St Austell, Cornwall on February the 8th in 2013 and later, died.

Paramedics were called to the house twice on the night of Titterington's death. She was complaining about pain between her shoulder blades and looked pale on the first visit. However she didn't want to go to the doctors and was wearing a loose nightie so her abdominal swelling was not visible to the paramedics.

A post-mortem examination revealed that Emily had a 'massive extension of the large bowel', causing her death.

When Coroner Dr Emma Carlyon was asked to describe the severity of the condition, she said 'It was like nothing I've ever seen before - It was dramatic.'

Titterington was pronounced dead at Royal Cornwall Hospital in Truro.

Her GP Dr Alistair James said that in the leadup to Titterington's death, both he and her mother battled to persuade her to be medically examined, but to no success. Additionally, the inquest found that Titterington refused to be medically examined but could've been saved if she sought medical attention.